Debt that is not mine. I don't know what to do?

[IcingOnTheCake]

I will start from the beginning. In 2003 a credit card company offered me a card with a £200 limit so i accepted it (i will call it company A). I used the card once to pay for my theary test costing £15 and payed it. Then my bank offered me a card so i choose to just use that and not use company A anymore. I moved out of the address of which the card from company A was registered with in 2004 and didn't even think about it again as i wasn't using it.I have no idea where the card is now.

Last friday i received a letter from a debt collecting company saying i owed them £485. I immiediatly phoned this company (i will call it company B) and said to them i didn't know anything about this and they told me to phone company A and get transaction statements from them. So i phoned company A and requested the statements and they said they would be sent to me.

So i wait all week getting more and more worried about it and still no statements. So today i phoned company B and said to them i still haven't been sent the statements and the guy i spoke to was very nasty to me and said i had to give him payments. I said i can't do anything yet until i recieve the statements because i am not going to start paying for something that is nothing to do with me. He continued to get nasty saying he was going to send round debt collectors and get solicitors involved and he just wasn't lisening to what i was telling him.

So after we hung up i rang company A again and asked whether the statements were coming and the man said that they couldn't send any out because company B had bought my account. So again i ring company B and they said they only have a certain amount of info on me and i would have to get transaction statements from company A. I am now going around in circles, i rang company A again and finally someone says i will be sent the statements.

Now whether they turn up or not is a mystery but now i am so worried. I don't know what to do, what if no one believes me.

I would start with a complaint to company B about the way your phone call was handled. You should not have been threatened in that way no matter if the debt was yours or not, particularly as they have only just contacted you to request payment. Its not as if they have been requesting the money for ages and you have been ignoring them.

Followed up by a request in writing to company A for the statements you need.

do you think i should just complain about the guy i spoke to or complain about him AND explain the situation in writting

Do not pay anything until you have received the statements.
Have a look on moneysupermarket.com there are discussion forums where you will get lots of information regarding this kind of thing.

Its very frustrating and i will be very annoyed if i am not the statements again.

If they get solicitors involved, at least you have a chance of speaking to someone who should (one hopes) be professional and not threatening! Might be a good thing if they do this...

I was thinking about getting some advice from the citizens advice people when i get the statements. If i queary them with either company i think they are just gonna send me around in circles, i need someone who is going to take me seriously.

DH used to work for Halifax in the debt collection department. He suspects that Company A and Company B are the same company. Did you take out credit card insurance? Often that is the worst thing you can do, as when you finish using the card, the insurance paymetns still leave the credit cad account, you don't pay the instalments (thinking you have finished wiht card) so it incurs interest, next month another paymetn goes out etc etc.

Which credit card company is it?

Try writing a letter to one of the newspaper money advice columns - such as Guardian money on a saturday. When they get involved everything strangely gets sorted out

Good luck, don't pay anything - they need proof and if they don't send proof of your debt then you don't have to pay.

it was capital one the credit card and i did not take out insurance.

Contact trading standards. There is a code of practice which covers debt collection companies and Company B does not appear to be adhering to them.

Well if i am not sent these statements i will say to them that i don't owe them a penny and they are going to have to show me written evidence as to why and how i owe this money. If it went to court they would have to show evidence so they show me evidence now without it having to go as far a court. Can i say that to them? Or do they not need evidence as they are a dept collecting company?

If they issue court proceedings, they would have to show sufficient evidence to convince the court that you owe the money. So, if they issue proceedings having refused to provide the evidence now, you can inform the court that their proceedings are an abuse of the court process. Chances are they would be penalised re costs.

I would write a letter to them, stating that you do not owe any money and that, if they think that they do, they must provide evidence of your alleged indebtedness within the next 7 days. Tell them that time is of the essence and that, if they fail to produce said evidence and subsequently seek to recover any monies through the courts, you reserve the right to bring this letter to the attention of the court.

That sounds good, i will do that.